Jack Teagarden’s Super Double Album CD and now a “Bigger” Big Band Playlist

Here’s a great double album CD of two 5-star performances. If you would search for these albums separately they would be found under “Chicago and all that Jazz” and “The Dixie Sound Of Jack Teagarden.” It’s better to just purchase bothtogether and it’s worth it! I am also going to announce here in this post that I have added Dixie Jazz bands to the “Big Band” playlist, so the Jazz Con Class Radio listeners can get the full effect of big band Jazz. Enjoy!

About the Double Album CD:

“In 1961, shortly after filming the television special Chicago and All That Jazz (hosted by Gary Moore and featuring brief appearances by many of the alumni of the 1920s Chicago jazz scene); Eddie Condon had a special reunion that resulted in this LP. He gathered together six of the eight original members of the McKenzie-Condon Chicagoans of 1927 (himself on rhythm guitar, tenor saxophonist Bud Freeman, trumpeter Jimmy McPartland, pianist Joe Sullivan, bassist Bob Haggart and drummer Gene Krupa); had clarinetist Pee Wee Russell take the late Frankie Teschemacher’s spot, got bassist Bob Haggart to fill in for the retired Jim Lannigan and added trombonist Jack Teagarden. This LP finds the all-star band performing seven numbers, including three (“China Boy,” “Nobody’s Sweetheart Now” and “Sugar”) of the four originally cut in 1927………Read More

Biography of Jack Teagarden:

Among the many landmarks of the jazz scene is one that seems destined to last forever.

It’s the trombone artistry of Jack Teagarden. An honest kind of artistry, Teagardens tromboning is generally credited with having advanced the instrument to the high level of technical achievement it enjoys among today’s modern musicians, and, at the same time, has stated a case for the lyrical quality in jazz for the nearly forty years he has been playing professionally.

Although he once sang a blues line that testified he was born in Texas and raised in Tennessee. Weldon Leo Teagarden was born in Texas and raised in Oklahoma. His birthplace was Vernon, Texas, and the date was August 20, 1905. While still in his childhood he moved to Oklahoma. His mother gave him early piano lessons, and his father, a bit of a musician himself, presented Jack with a trombone on his seventh Christmas.

His brothers, Trumpeter Charlie and drummer Clois, have played on stand with him, off and on during the decades Jack has been blowing jazz. Jack spent considerable time as a youth listening to the music and the hymn singing at Negro religious meetings. Out of this, it’s surmised, he drew his earliest feeling for the blues.

He joined the Peck Kelly band in 1921, when he was sixteen years old, and hasn’t been off the scene since. He has played with Paul Whiteman’s big band, Benny Goodman’s recording groups, Louis Armstrong’s All Stars, Ben Pollock’s band, countless groups and orchestras, many of them under his own leadership. These days, he leads his own combo, one he has traveled successfully with to the Far East for the U.S. State Department.

Of this venture, nothing but praise—-both musical and personal—-rang from every port of the band’s call. The trip covered a grueling eighteen weeks and as many countries. It was studded with many highlights. For instance, Jack and crew jammed with the King of Cambodia who as clarinetist had jammed with his idol, Benny Goodman, when Benny had toured that area few years earlier.

Also Teagarden tuned the two available pianos in the remote city of Kabul, Afghanistan, where most of the populace had never seen brass musical instruments before.

Playing under adverse conditions of weather and health. Teagarden became ill in Japan, and returned after the tour a very weak and very sick man. He played the last six weeks of the tour with a serious hernia, but refused to undergo surgery until the commitments had been filled and all his dates had been played. He went, it appears, to superhuman lengths to live up to what he has stated to nearly interviewer: “I try to play what people like.” Generally, what people seem to like is Teagarden…….Read More

Testimonials By The Listeners

As a college English and Fine Arts professor, I have spent many long days and nights grading and writing papers with your station as my soundtrack. I can't thank you enough for the perfect score for such work, which I've been leaning on for the last four years. I've always been obsessed with jazz, but like many fans, I'm selective and looking to avoid the obvious. Jazz Con Class hits all the right notes, and while I love to hear my favorites (Bird, Trane, Monk, Morgan, Hubbard, Blakey), the variety of deep cuts is what brings me back. Thank you for the thoughtful intent and love for this music that shines through in every playlist.